This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

The Salt Lake Tribune celebrated the centennial of the Pulitzer Prizes Thursday with Weller Book Works, as passionate readers pitched their favorite prize-winning novels.

The Tribune's Jennifer Napier-Pearce moderated the speed-dating style contest, and Erika George, a University of Utah law professor, won with her advocacy for "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao," by Junot Diaz, the 2008 winner.

Catherine Weller, co-owner of Weller Book Works, introduced this year's fiction winner, "The Sympathizer: A Novel," by Viet Thanh Nguyen.

An audience member who has read 31 of the novels on the Pulitzer list won an ultimate reading kit, with books, tea and a gift certificate to Weller Book Works. A centennial birthday cake created by Salt Cake City recreated a stack of prize-winning novels with a recent edition of The Salt Lake Tribune on top.

This event is part of The Tribune's celebration of the centennial, supported by a Pulitzer Prizes Centennial Campfires Initiative grant to Utah Humanities, The Tribune, Utah Public Radio and KCPW.

The initiative is a joint venture of the Pulitzer Prizes Board and the Federation of State Humanities Council in celebration of the 2016 centennial of the Prizes. It seeks to illuminate the impact of journalism and the humanities on American life today, to imagine their future and to inspire new generations to consider the values represented by the body of Pulitzer Prize-winning work.